‘Fantastic’ open day at Hillbrow Health and Wellbeing

Representatives from organisations and public bodies across Eastbourne turned out in force for the official opening of Hillbrow Health and Wellbeing in Meads.

The event on Tuesday (August 21) marked Wave Active and South Downs Health & Care (SDHC) becoming new operators of the centre.

Eastbourne MP Josh Babarinde, Eastbourne Borough Council Leader Stephen Holt, Meads councillors and representatives from community health and primary care were among those who attended the opening day. Local people of all ages also enjoyed trying out free sports and activity sessions on offer.

Duncan Kerr, Chief Executive of Wave Active, said: “The community support for our opening day was fantastic and it was a great opportunity for local people to discover new activities and ways of enjoying exercise.

“As part of the preparations for our takeover, we have really enjoyed meeting current and potential members and look forward to seeing everyone using Hillbrow Health and Wellbeing facilities.”

Wave Active is a charity and social enterprise that operates sports and leisure centres on behalf of Eastbourne Borough Council and Lewes District Council, while SDHC is a social enterprise that is owned by a number of GP practices in the area. The new team is planning to bring together leisure and traditional NHS general practice within Hillbrow and in the longer term, offer private healthcare interventions too.

Nick Harvey, who is a GP and CEO of SDHC, said: “Thank you to everyone who came along to the opening day. It is a significant step in our exciting vision to enable our community to have the best possible health and wellbeing through the genuine integration of a healthy living, activity focused, leisure and sports centre with high quality healthcare services.”

For more information visit www.waveleisure.co.uk/hillbrow-health-and-wellbeing or call into the centre.